A Pakistani man has been sentenced by a US court to 12 years in prison for illegally unlocking a mobile phone. The work has cost the American telecom company AT&T AT 200 million. According to the Xinhua News Agency, the U.S. Attorney's Office in Seattle said Mohammed Fahad, 35, of Karachi, Pakistan, and his accomplice had been unlocking phones for seven years to defraud AT&T.Mohammed Fahad had a big hand in doing all this.
The forensic analysis of AT&T in the official statement revealed that 19,00,033 phones were unlocked by Mohammed Fahad and his co-conspirators. This has cost the company 20 20,14,97,430 dollars and 94 cents in 7 years. During the sentencing hearing, U.S. District Judge Robert S. Lasnik said Fahad had committed a horrific cybercrime, the report said.
Mohammed Fahad started the scam in 2012 and, among others, plotted to unlock a large number of lucrative cellular phones at a call center in Bothel, Washington, to recruit AT&T staff. Mohammed Fahd hired ‘AT&T’ employees to unlock phones for ineligible customers and bribed them. Mohammed Fahad then bribed employees to install custom malware and hacking tools, allowing him to unlock phones from Pakistan.
In September 2020, he was found guilty of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, the report said. U.S. Acting Attorney Tessa M. Gorman said, "This is an old cyber criminal who has used his technical skills. Also, bribery and intimidation have been used for this. That cost the company 200 million. "